28 August 2017

Pre-History

'Homer Caetani', Roman copy of Hellenistic statue

Dark Age

  • 'Geometric Period' (in art)
  • c.1100-c.800 BC
  • Widespread use of iron
  • Emergence of city-states (poleis)
  • Phoenecian Abjad adapted c8

Heinrich Schliemann (1822-1890)

  • Systematic albeit 'brutal' excavation
  • Troy, Mycenae & Tiryns in 1870s and 80s

Bronze Age 'Collapse', c12 BC

Bronze Age Chronology

  • Few absolute dates, almost everything is relative
  • Periods defined regionally
    • Crete (Minoan)
    • Mainland (Helladic)
    • Aegean Islands (Cycladic)
  • Appriximate dates
    • Early (before 3000-c.2000 BC)
    • Middle (c.2000-c.1725 [high] or c.1625 [low] BC)
    • Late (c.1725 [high] or c.1625 [low]-c.1200 BC)
  • Unknown when Greeks entered region. Lots of non-Greek place-names (-nth- or -ss-)

Bronze Age Greece, circa 2500-1100 BC

Mycenae, near Argos

  • c16 rise to power, Grave Circles A and B
  • c14 Tholos Tombs
  • c13 Palace and Fortress Walls
  • mid-c13 fire destruction, new water source
  • 1200 further destruction, decline

Minoan-influnced wall painting at Mycenae

Satellite view of Mycenae, note the size of cars and busses in the parking lot

Grave Circle A (c16 BC)

Entrance to the 'Tomb of Clydemnestra' (c14 BC)

Plan of the Tholos tomb

'Cyclopean' Walls and Lion Gate (c13 BC), with lecturer for scale

Pre-alphabetic Greek scripts

  • Heiroglyphs (c.1900-c.1625 BC)
  • Linear A (c.1800-c.1450 BC)
    • Crete and the Cyclades
    • Still undeciphered
  • Linear B (most examples date to c13 BC)
    • Same symbols as Linear A
    • Greek, deciphered by Michael Ventris in 1953
    • Mixture of ideograms, decimal numeral system, and syllabic
  • Cyprio-Minoan (c15-c12 BC)
    • Derived from Linear B
    • Predecessor of Classical Cypriot Syllabary (c7-c3 BC)

Linear B, example from the National Archaeological Museum in Athens

Hittite Empire at its peak (in c.1300 BC)

Hittite Records

If some enemy arises for you, I will not abandon you, just as I have not now abandoned you, I will kill your enemy for you. But if your brother or someone of your family revolts against you, Alaksandu, or later someone revolts against your son or your grandsons, and they seek the kingship of the land of Wilusa, I, My Majesty, will absolutely not depose you, Alaksandu.

from the so-called 'treaty' between Muwattalli II of Hatti and Alaksandu of Wilusa, c13 BC, tr. G, Beckman, Hittite Diplomatic Texts 2nd ed. (1999)